So I'm running a list of 2 rookie pilots, biggs, and wedge. Should I put r2d2 on Biggs on wedge and why?

Wedge. Biggs will die first with or without R2D2. If you kill a few ships before that happens though, Wedge should be able to stay pretty healthy with R2 on him. If this happens I will virtually guarantee you will win, since Wedge with R2D2 vs most any other pilot will heavily favor Wedge and his offensive output.

Wedge. This setup is a nightmare to get rid of late game. If Wedge is in it late in the game our opponent is most likely going to lose.

you should put R2D2 on 1 of the Rookies.

Biggs will die first, and get hit when your opponent's squad is mostly intact, so putting R2D2 on him is a big nono

Afterwards, Wedge would likely be the next target since he's the most dangerous. Depending on how much of your opponent's squad is left by then, putting R2D2 on Wedge may or may not be a good decision, but either way Wedge would survive for a bit longer for sure.

at the end of it all, your Rookie Xwings are the lowest priority targets, so if you put R2D2 on one of them, it is the most likely to survive into the endgame, where your opponent would not have enough firepower to really deal with R2D2 that does green every single turn. Moreover, in the midgame the R2D2 rookie could screw up your opponent's targetting decision, and hence take some flak off Wedge, thus allowing Wedge to maybe survive a bit longer too

My answer to the question posed in the thread title is always Luke.

My answer to the question posed in the OP is that if you can't put R2-D2 on Luke, you should at least avoid putting him on Biggs. Biggs is going to take concentrated fire from multiple attackers, which is the scenario in which Artoo is least effective--he makes you fly predictably and restores just 1 shield per round, which has no effect on his lifespan if your opponent can deal at least 3 damage per round.

As Duraham says, in this list I'd actually place Artoo with a Rookie, because that will either (a) pull fire away from Wedge, or (b) help ensure that Artoo survives into the endgame where he's at his most powerful. You gain a pretty substantial benefit either way.

My thought would be put it on a Rookie followed by Wedge although the real truth is I'd probably find a different upgrade, or upgrades, to use.

you should put R2D2 on 1 of the Rookies.

Biggs will die first, and get hit when your opponent's squad is mostly intact, so putting R2D2 on him is a big nono

Afterwards, Wedge would likely be the next target since he's the most dangerous. Depending on how much of your opponent's squad is left by then, putting R2D2 on Wedge may or may not be a good decision, but either way Wedge would survive for a bit longer for sure.

at the end of it all, your Rookie Xwings are the lowest priority targets, so if you put R2D2 on one of them, it is the most likely to survive into the endgame, where your opponent would not have enough firepower to really deal with R2D2 that does green every single turn. Moreover, in the midgame the R2D2 rookie could screw up your opponent's targetting decision, and hence take some flak off Wedge, thus allowing Wedge to maybe survive a bit longer too

I 100% agree with this. R2D2 is best at lower points, aka, end game. The kill order is Biggs, Wedge, Rookie, Rookie. So, if Biggs and Wedge die quickly, R2D2 on either of them wouldn't have really helped anyways. If they take a while to kill, then you've pretty much already won, regardless of where R2D2 is.

But, if it ends up taking about as much time as it's supposed to, you should be left facing ~50 points with your two rookies. This could go either way at that point, but the R2D2 on the Rookie at 50 points (nevertheless if they kill the other rookie first and you're looking at ~25 pts on the board) is overpowered and next to impossible to actually kill that rookie.

I play Biggs a different way. (And thus far I haven't lost with this set up) Put R2D2 on Biggs (and a shield upgrade if your have the spare points). Then, keep Biggs in R3 of your opponent, while the rest of your crew swoops in for R1 and 2 shots. It takes some practice and skill to keep this up. Doing so puts your opponent in a bad spot. If they purposely turn their back to Biggs, they are getting shot (and at R1 and 2 if you're keeping your other ships in position) from behind and you've more than likely busted up your opponents ability to focus fire on one ship. If they do decide to attempt to drop Biggs quick, the rest of your fleet is in the clear to focus fire and start dropping a ship at a time.

I often feel Biggs is one of the most misunderstood pilots in the game. He is more than just a sacrificial lamb. If played right, he doesn't have to die at all. He's there to force bad shots, and R2-D2 lets him shake off the one or two hits he might receive here and there.

I also agree that R2 is probably best on the rookie. He is great on Wedge but also makes him more of a target than he already is. I think the best Mech on Biggs would be R2-F2. The tricky part is to keep him flying at R3. But 4 agility dice is hard to crack. Biggs takes too many hits for R2-D2 to keep up. It also makes him predictable when he moves. Now i always say this is an offensive game and building for defense never seems to work (in my experience) but Biggs with R2-F2 can be pretty good barring crappy dice rolls.

I also agree that R2 is probably best on the rookie. He is great on Wedge but also makes him more of a target than he already is. I think the best Mech on Biggs would be R2-F2. The tricky part is to keep him flying at R3. But 4 agility dice is hard to crack. Biggs takes too many hits for R2-D2 to keep up. It also makes him predictable when he moves. Now i always say this is an offensive game and building for defense never seems to work (in my experience) but Biggs with R2-F2 can be pretty good barring crappy dice rolls.

The problem with this logic is 4 dice without focus is not better than 3 dice with focus. Just because Biggs CAN be shot up by the entire enemy fleet doesn't mean he should be. Care should be taken to keep him out of a swarm's cross-hairs. Only 1 or 2 ships should ever be shooting at him in a round.

To keep Biggs in such situations, I strong recommend that you ONLY use Biggs if you're willing to also invest in a PS 7-9 pilot to keep in front of him. This way, you have a chance to thin out the heard before the entire heard gets a chance to shoot a Biggs.

I do like the R2-F2 idea though and think it would work if Biggs had Kyle handing him a focus token every round.

I also agree that R2 is probably best on the rookie. He is great on Wedge but also makes him more of a target than he already is. I think the best Mech on Biggs would be R2-F2. The tricky part is to keep him flying at R3. But 4 agility dice is hard to crack. Biggs takes too many hits for R2-D2 to keep up. It also makes him predictable when he moves. Now i always say this is an offensive game and building for defense never seems to work (in my experience) but Biggs with R2-F2 can be pretty good barring crappy dice rolls.

The problem with this logic is 4 dice without focus is not better than 3 dice with focus. Just because Biggs CAN be shot up by the entire enemy fleet doesn't mean he should be. Care should be taken to keep him out of a swarm's cross-hairs. Only 1 or 2 ships should ever be shooting at him in a round.

To keep Biggs in such situations, I strong recommend that you ONLY use Biggs if you're willing to also invest in a PS 7-9 pilot to keep in front of him. This way, you have a chance to thin out the heard before the entire heard gets a chance to shoot a Biggs.

I do like the R2-F2 idea though and think it would work if Biggs had Kyle handing him a focus token every round.

Makes sense odds wise. I just love rolling dice. I like the idea of Kyle or maybe Garven handing him a focus. But as i said before its an offensive game and building for Defense seems to always lose. My friend had Biggs with R2-F2 flew him really well at R3 and was also able to stay behind asteroids. He was bragging about rolling 5 agility dice and the first attack on Biggs he rolled 5 blanks and i hit him with missiles! Offense goes BOOM!

I also agree that R2 is probably best on the rookie. He is great on Wedge but also makes him more of a target than he already is. I think the best Mech on Biggs would be R2-F2. The tricky part is to keep him flying at R3. But 4 agility dice is hard to crack. Biggs takes too many hits for R2-D2 to keep up. It also makes him predictable when he moves. Now i always say this is an offensive game and building for defense never seems to work (in my experience) but Biggs with R2-F2 can be pretty good barring crappy dice rolls.

The problem with this logic is 4 dice without focus is not better than 3 dice with focus. Just because Biggs CAN be shot up by the entire enemy fleet doesn't mean he should be. Care should be taken to keep him out of a swarm's cross-hairs. Only 1 or 2 ships should ever be shooting at him in a round.

To keep Biggs in such situations, I strong recommend that you ONLY use Biggs if you're willing to also invest in a PS 7-9 pilot to keep in front of him. This way, you have a chance to thin out the heard before the entire heard gets a chance to shoot a Biggs.

I do like the R2-F2 idea though and think it would work if Biggs had Kyle handing him a focus token every round.

Makes sense odds wise. I just love rolling dice. I like the idea of Kyle or maybe Garven handing him a focus. But as i said before its an offensive game and building for Defense seems to always lose. My friend had Biggs with R2-F2 flew him really well at R3 and was also able to stay behind asteroids. He was bragging about rolling 5 agility dice and the first attack on Biggs he rolled 5 blanks and i hit him with missiles! Offense goes BOOM!

Next time, tell him that he has a 10% chance of rolling those 5 blanks, so it's not particularly uncommon.

I also agree that R2 is probably best on the rookie. He is great on Wedge but also makes him more of a target than he already is. I think the best Mech on Biggs would be R2-F2. The tricky part is to keep him flying at R3. But 4 agility dice is hard to crack. Biggs takes too many hits for R2-D2 to keep up. It also makes him predictable when he moves. Now i always say this is an offensive game and building for defense never seems to work (in my experience) but Biggs with R2-F2 can be pretty good barring crappy dice rolls.

The problem with this logic is 4 dice without focus is not better than 3 dice with focus. Just because Biggs CAN be shot up by the entire enemy fleet doesn't mean he should be. Care should be taken to keep him out of a swarm's cross-hairs. Only 1 or 2 ships should ever be shooting at him in a round.

To keep Biggs in such situations, I strong recommend that you ONLY use Biggs if you're willing to also invest in a PS 7-9 pilot to keep in front of him. This way, you have a chance to thin out the heard before the entire heard gets a chance to shoot a Biggs.

I do like the R2-F2 idea though and think it would work if Biggs had Kyle handing him a focus token every round.

Makes sense odds wise. I just love rolling dice. I like the idea of Kyle or maybe Garven handing him a focus. But as i said before its an offensive game and building for Defense seems to always lose.

Defense first doesn't loose, defense without offense looses (or causes a draw). The winner of the Super Bowl has been a top 10 defense 38 times. 22 time it has been a top 3. "Defense wins championships."

Biggs is not pure defense. He rolls 3 attack die and can be fitted with a proton torpedo. X-wings are an offensive force to be reckoned with. Further more, he has a PS of 5; so he will shoot before any swarm level ship does. Biggs provides defense and offense when he is played correctly. Then, what ever is left of the swarm you took on, HAS to fire at Biggs instead of your poor B-wing with only 1 defense die.

I will continue to sing Biggs praises and how important a balanced fleet is. But it won't bother me come game time if no one listens.

(I'll lead off by saying that I'm not sure we're really disagreeing at this point.)

Defense first doesn't loose, defense without offense looses (or causes a draw). The winner of the Super Bowl has been a top 10 defense 38 times. 22 time it has been a top 3.

That would be relevant if we were talking about football. Quite seriously, though, one of the reasons for those stats is that in football it's possible to score on defense (and/or special teams)--IIRC, this year the Seahawks would have won even if their offense had never even taken the field. So there wasn't really any cost for their decision to focus a lot of their time and training effort (and money) on building up that side of the team; they proved pretty effectively that there's no such thing as too much defense in the NFL.

If defense won championships in X-wing, though, we'd see a lot more TIE Advanced and A-wings in the top tier of major tournaments. Instead, what we see consistently is that lists need just enough defense to weather the opening rounds of a typical matchup. But past that point, defense is subject to pretty severely diminishing returns.

When he's flown well, Biggs forces your opponent to divide his or her fire and make bad shots instead of good ones--and in that context he's so good I wonder if he's a balance issue. After all, there aren't many cards in the game that force your opponent to make a particular decision, probably because it's not much fun to have that element of choice taken away.

More typically, though, he's just a slightly more expensive Rookie Pilot with an occasionally meaningful PS bid, and he dies in the second round of engagement with contributing anything for those extra 4 points. And, to tie this all back to the thread topic, in that typical context adding another 4 points for R2-D2 is just a free gift to your opponent.

One to many O 's in your lose. Maybe you are thinking O ffensively. Good point about Bigg still carrying the punch of an Xwing. (if he gets to shoot) I agree with you that a balanced fleet is better. All defense without offense won't win much. Not sure football comparisons are relevant to a miniatures game. But i guess when i say to build defensively loses i am looking at the whole structure of the game with many more pilots, ships, upgrades being more geared to offensive strategies. Not to say defense isn't important. But i feel to BUILD a fleet defensively is not going to win much. Flying a certain way or starting placement or action choices are much better ways to be defensive IMO.

(I'll lead off by saying that I'm not sure we're really disagreeing at this point.)

Defense first doesn't loose, defense without offense looses (or causes a draw). The winner of the Super Bowl has been a top 10 defense 38 times. 22 time it has been a top 3.

If defense won championships in X-wing, though, we'd see a lot more TIE Advanced and A-wings in the top tier of major tournaments. Instead, what we see consistently is that lists need just enough defense to weather the opening rounds of a typical matchup. But past that point, defense is subject to pretty severely diminishing returns.

When he's flown well, Biggs forces your opponent to divide his or her fire and make bad shots instead of good ones--and in that context he's so good I wonder if he's a balance issue. After all, there aren't many cards in the game that force your opponent to make a particular decision, probably because it's not much fun to have that element of choice taken away.

More typically, though, he's just a slightly more expensive Rookie Pilot with an occasionally meaningful PS bid, and he dies in the second round of engagement with contributing anything for those extra 4 points. And, to tie this all back to the thread topic, in that typical context adding another 4 points for R2-D2 is just a free gift to your opponent.

Alright.... Two points to tackle here:

1) Defense not winning at X-wing: I will propose to you that I could build a winning squad with nothing but the ships you stated couldn't win with just their defense (A-wings and Tie-As). My strategy? An annoying defensive one. I will take advantage of the time limit rule. I will bide my time, get a kill when the chance comes about, and then run around the board until time is called. (I've seen this done too...) Is it as fun as offense first? Maybe not, but it works!

2) Biggs dies in the second round. What are you doing to poor Biggs!?!? Just because he forces people to shoot at him when they are able doesn't mean you have to put him in harms way of every ship out there. Heck, a round might go by where no one CAN fire at Biggs (giving R2-D2 another round to regenerate another shield). Take your time, set up your shots, and force your opponent to make mistakes. In this sense, the defense is scoring. Making a move that takes you completely out of the battle next round often catches your opponent off guard and sets you up for a R1 shot to the back next round.

And yes, I don't think we disagree. We just have a different idea of the importance of balance and defense.

Flying a certain way or starting placement or action choices are much better ways to be defensive IMO.

BINGO! Those are defensive elements of X-wing. As is the agility score of your ships and their abilities. Flying four B-wings nets you a ton of offense, but with only 1 defense die and a limited movement dial, they are sitting ducks.

I just took advantage of CoolStuffInc.'s current mega deal on Tie-As. I'm going to prove a point next game. I'm calling my fleet "Vader's Revenge". I've already built a winning all A-wing fleet (and yes, I called it "The A-Team") but I feel now the poor Tie-A needs a defender.

2) Biggs dies in the second round. What are you doing to poor Biggs!?!?

Yeah, this. I put R2 on Biggs once and he kept 4 TIEs busy and away from my Falcon for 6 turns before they finally downed him.

Alright.... Two points to tackle here:

1) Defense not winning at X-wing: I will propose to you that I could build a winning squad with nothing but the ships you stated couldn't win with just their defense (A-wings and Tie-As). My strategy? An annoying defensive one. I will take advantage of the time limit rule. I will bide my time, get a kill when the chance comes about, and then run around the board until time is called. (I've seen this done too...) Is it as fun as offense first? Maybe not, but it works!

I didn't say they couldn't win--I said they don't appear very often at or near the top of tournaments. You're describing a "turtle" list/strategy, and the problem is that in X-wing they're just not very reliable. You have to get ahead of your opponent (which can be tough with a relatively weak offense), and then you have to stay ahead of your opponent (which usually means you can't afford bad defense rolls). It can work, and I've been on both sides of that equation, but it doesn't work often enough to make most deliberately defense-heavy lists into serious competitors.

2) Biggs dies in the second round. What are you doing to poor Biggs!?!? Just because he forces people to shoot at him when they are able doesn't mean you have to put him in harms way of every ship out there. Heck, a round might go by where no one CAN fire at Biggs (giving R2-D2 another round to regenerate another shield). Take your time, set up your shots, and force your opponent to make mistakes. In this sense, the defense is scoring. Making a move that takes you completely out of the battle next round often catches your opponent off guard and sets you up for a R1 shot to the back next round.

Speaking personally, I'm not doing anything to Biggs--I think he's boring to fly and boring to fly against, so I usually leave him out. When I do fly him, I prefer to leave him out of range entirely in the first round of attacks, and then place him at Range 3 for the second round--so that rather than continuing to focus fire on someone who's now at close range, my opponent has to switch targets to a different target at long range. Preferably he'll also come in a different vector than the rest of my ships, so that some but not all of my opponent's ships will be able to get him in-arc on the next round.

But too many times to count I've seen people run him in the back row of a 2x2 box formation (or as the rearmost point of a reverse-delta formation). When that happens, it's no longer about whether Biggs will die early--it's a question of how many attacks he'll get before he goes, and the smart money isn't on 3...

But too many times to count I've seen people run him in the back row of a 2x2 box formation (or as the rearmost point of a reverse-delta formation). When that happens, it's no longer about whether Biggs will die early--it's a question of how many attacks he'll get before he goes, and the smart money isn't on 3...

Again, BINGO! This is not where you want Biggs to be. Biggs should be out in front, forcing the action. The plan should be to divide and conquer, not hold off your opponent for as long as possible.

So, the flavor of the month right now is offense, offense, offense. Wave 3 and the Aces have a lot to due with that. It is a way to play, and many or doing so successfully. I wonder what the flavor of the month will be when wave 4 drops?

It's weird. I've been trolling the forums here for a few months now, and while this thread seems to extoll the virtues of placing R2 on anyone BUT Biggs, I've seen many lists that say the opposite. Most lists I've seen say to throw shield upgrade and R2 on Biggs. With 3 Shields and 3 hull, and the ability to regenerate with R2, why wouldn't you use it on him?? If it means keeping your other ships in the battle even only 1 more round to take their shots, it just seems to make sense.

Tell me where I'm wrong? What am I not seeing that everyone else is..

It's weird. I've been trolling the forums here for a few months now, and while this thread seems to extoll the virtues of placing R2 on anyone BUT Biggs, I've seen many lists that say the opposite. Most lists I've seen say to throw shield upgrade and R2 on Biggs. With 3 Shields and 3 hull, and the ability to regenerate with R2, why wouldn't you use it on him?? If it means keeping your other ships in the battle even only 1 more round to take their shots, it just seems to make sense.

Tell me where I'm wrong? What am I not seeing that everyone else is..

By R2, I'm assuming you mean R2-D2 and not the generic R2 unit...

I'm with you on this one. I've run Biggs with R2-D2 and a shield upgrade in many a games with great success. Most games I've played the opponent tries to kill Biggs for a few rounds, then gives up hoping to go back to him. This ends poorly for them. The flavor of the month right now is that any points spent on something that doesn't DIRECTLY add to offense is a waste.

But too many times to count I've seen people run him in the back row of a 2x2 box formation (or as the rearmost point of a reverse-delta formation). When that happens, it's no longer about whether Biggs will die early--it's a question of how many attacks he'll get before he goes, and the smart money isn't on 3...

Again, BINGO! This is not where you want Biggs to be. Biggs should be out in front, forcing the action. The plan should be to divide and conquer, not hold off your opponent for as long as possible.

So, the flavor of the month right now is offense, offense, offense. Wave 3 and the Aces have a lot to due with that. It is a way to play, and many or doing so successfully. I wonder what the flavor of the month will be when wave 4 drops?

I disagree with your assessment entirely. Just because B-Wings (as an example) only have 1 agility dice does not mean they are "all offense". Their defense comes from the massive (for the cost at least) amount of damage they can sustain prior to being killed. Sure, they don't get to roll so many fancy green dice, but that does not at all make them "glass cannons". They are just another (arguably better) form of defense. Some ships, like the basic TIE, A-Wings, Interceptors, etc get their defense from the number of agility dice and others like the b-wing, y-wing, Bomber, etc. get it from volume of damage they can sustain. The remaining ships, like the X, get it from a combination of the two.

All ships thus far have some balance of offense and defense. The fact of the matter though is that the attack die is inherently better than the agility die, and that's not refutable. You will fail to do damage significantly less often than you will fail to evade damage. Additionally, it is much less damaging to fail on an attack roll than it is to fail on a defense roll, further reducing the agility die's value in favor of additional hit points. There are tons of articles on this subject so I won't go too far into that point, but the jist of it is the difference between being proactive or reactive. In general, being proactive and forcing your opponent to react is much better than being reactive and trying to slow down/stop your opponent.

I agree with you about Biggs to a point. As soon as he is revealed to be in a list he is almost automatically priority #1, and regardless of how sneaky you will try to be, he will be focused down as soon as realistically possible by any competent opponent. You can try and say "omg you are all playing wrong" but the fact of the matter is that good opponents will go and get him regardless of how you try and game them. Also, I think you may be forgetting that the opponent only has to target him if he is at range 1 of the ships he is protecting, which can be more difficult to do in practice than it is to talk about on a forum. If your opponents see it coming that you are going to hold him at range three and push to 1/2 with your other pilots, most opponents will hold back/stall until after you separate to fight that then take Biggs as quickly as possible.

Biggs is a great pilot, for all the reasons you mentioned, but I do think you are overstating his survivability quite a bit.

It's weird. I've been trolling the forums here for a few months now, and while this thread seems to extoll the virtues of placing R2 on anyone BUT Biggs, I've seen many lists that say the opposite. Most lists I've seen say to throw shield upgrade and R2 on Biggs. With 3 Shields and 3 hull, and the ability to regenerate with R2, why wouldn't you use it on him?? If it means keeping your other ships in the battle even only 1 more round to take their shots, it just seems to make sense.

Tell me where I'm wrong? What am I not seeing that everyone else is..

By R2, I'm assuming you mean R2-D2 and not the generic R2 unit...

I'm with you on this one. I've run Biggs with R2-D2 and a shield upgrade in many a games with great success. Most games I've played the opponent tries to kill Biggs for a few rounds, then gives up hoping to go back to him. This ends poorly for them. The flavor of the month right now is that any points spent on something that doesn't DIRECTLY add to offense is a waste.

In your meta maybe. The reigning world champ seems to think that 3xBlue with HLC and sensor jammer is a tough nut to crack these days. I'm certain that has everything to do with the HLCs and nothing to do with the Jammers.

But too many times to count I've seen people run him in the back row of a 2x2 box formation (or as the rearmost point of a reverse-delta formation). When that happens, it's no longer about whether Biggs will die early--it's a question of how many attacks he'll get before he goes, and the smart money isn't on 3...

Again, BINGO! This is not where you want Biggs to be. Biggs should be out in front, forcing the action. The plan should be to divide and conquer, not hold off your opponent for as long as possible.

So, the flavor of the month right now is offense, offense, offense. Wave 3 and the Aces have a lot to due with that. It is a way to play, and many or doing so successfully. I wonder what the flavor of the month will be when wave 4 drops?

I disagree with your assessment entirely. Just because B-Wings (as an example) only have 1 agility dice does not mean they are "all offense". Their defense comes from the massive (for the cost at least) amount of damage they can sustain prior to being killed. Sure, they don't get to roll so many fancy green dice, but that does not at all make them "glass cannons". They are just another (arguably better) form of defense. Some ships, like the basic TIE, A-Wings, Interceptors, etc get their defense from the number of agility dice and others like the b-wing, y-wing, Bomber, etc. get it from volume of damage they can sustain. The remaining ships, like the X, get it from a combination of the two.

Biggs is a great pilot, for all the reasons you mentioned, but I do think you are overstating his survivability quite a bit.

I LOOOOOOOOVE B-wings. But the need a wing man more than any other Rebel ship does because of their movement dial and low defense. Pair a B-wing with the HWK or a Y-wing (w\ Ion Cannon) and you've got a serious threat on your hands.

The red dice are important, just not the end all be all of this game. Biggs is a target, you want him to be a target and you want your opponent to fail at targeting him for as long as possible. The more you fly him, the better you get at doing this.